Vancouver Canucks vs. Nashville Predators: 2024 Stanley Cup playoff series preview and pick

Vancouver Canucks: 1^st in Pacific Division, 109 points*
Nashville Predators: 1^st Western Conference Wild Card, 99 points

* – with one game remaining

Schedule (ET)

To be announced

The Skinny

This will be the second meeting between the Predators and Canucks in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. These two teams last faced off in the second round of the 2011 postseason, with Ryan Kesler and the Sedins leading the Canucks past the Predators four games to two.

Of course, these two teams couldn’t look more different today than they did 13 years ago, but that’s not to say there aren’t still a few similarities under the surface. Predators legends Pekka Rinne and Shea Weber may be gone, but they’ve been replaced in Nashville by Juuse Saros and Roman Josi. J.T. Miller evokes some memories of Kesler with his intensity and skill. And as was the case in 2011, these Canucks will enter this series as the heavy favorites over the lower-seeded Preds.

Vancouver is coming off a sweep of the season series against Nashville (more on that later) and is currently riding a two-game winning streak heading into Thursday’s 2023–24 season finale against the Winnipeg Jets. Nashville is a bit more rested — they haven’t played since Monday — and wrapped up its season with three consecutive wins. These are two teams running pretty warm at exactly the right time. It’ll be fascinating to see how they fare against each other under the bright lights.

It’s worth noting that this is only Vancouver’s second time qualifying for the playoffs since 2015. Save for a surprising run in the 2020 playoff bubble, the Canucks haven’t done anything of note past the middle of April for the better part of the last decade. Conversely, the Predators have been perennially in or around the playoff picture for the last number of years but have only advanced past the first round once since reaching the Stanley Cup Final in 2017.

Head to Head

Vancouver: 3-0-0
Nashville: 0-0-3

The Canucks and Predators got all three of their games against each other out of the way in the first half of the 2023–24 season. After winning by a 3-2 score in Nashville on Oct. 24, the Canucks took the final two games of the season series by 5-2 finals in Vancouver on Oct. 31 and in Nasvhille on Dec. 19. Elias Pettersson had a particularly strong go of it against the Predators during the regular season, scoring five points in three games (including a hat trick on Halloween night).

Top Five Scorers

Vancouver*

J.T. Miller, 103 points
Quinn Hughes, 91 points
Elias Pettersson, 89 points
Brock Boeser, 73 points
Filip Hronek, 48 points

* – With one game remaining

Nashville

Filip Forsberg, 94 points
Roman Josi, 85 points
Gustav Nyquist, 75 points
Ryan O’Reilly, 69 points
Tommy Novak, 45 points

X-Factor

With the way he’s playing, Filip Forsberg has to be the X-Factor for this Predators team. If it weren’t for the unprecedented four-headed monster dominating this year’s Hart Trophy discussion, Forsberg would probably be getting more recognition as a potential MVP candidate. The 29-year-old winger truly came into his own as the driving offensive force behind this year’s Predators team, racking up 48 goals and 94 points in 82 games while seemingly bending the game to his will during his shifts.

Let’s face it: Nashville doesn’t have an overwhelming forward group on paper. No, it’s not intended as shade toward guys like Ryan O’Reilly, Gustav Nyquist, Tommy Novak, Luke Evangelista, or Colton Sissons, but it’s just stating a fact to say that Nashville doesn’t have the same firepower as its fellow Western Conference playoff teams. They’ve made do for much of this season with a patchwork depth chart littered with players slotted above their means. But having a player of Forsberg’s caliber leading the charge has undoubtedly made it a lot easier on the other members of this Nashville forward group.

Sometimes, all a team needs to be successful is to have one cornerstone setting the standard at each position. Forsberg is Nashville’s benchmark at forward; Josi and Juuse Saros are the big boys on defense and in goal. In a series against a star-heavy team like the Canucks, it’ll be Forsberg who has to carry the mail to the greatest extent of those three. Who else is able to go blow-for-blow with the likes of Pettersson and Miller?

Offense

Somewhat surprisingly, the Canucks have managed just eight more goals than the Predators (277 to 269) in one fewer game played this season. Make no mistake, 277 goals is still a lot … but, for instance, it’s still less than what the Detroit Red Wings mustered up while missing the playoffs. Five different teams finished the 2023–24 season with more than 290 goals and, assuming that the Colorado Avalanche aren’t shut out by the Edmonton Oilers on Thursday, two teams will end up with at least 300. Comparatively, the Canucks and Predators currently rank ninth and 10th in league scoring.

Vancouver boasted the stronger power play of the two teams this season, with its 22.5 percent conversion rate ranking 10th in the league. Nashville finished 16th, at 21.6 percent. Miller led the Canucks with 40 power-play points this season, while Brock Boeser fired home a team-leading 16 power-play goals; O’Reilly paced the Preds with 14 power-play goals, while Josi narrowly edged out Forsberg with 33 power-play points.

Although the Canucks didn’t drive play in the offensive zone at even strength to an overwhelming degree in the 2023–24 season, they managed to convert on their chances at a better rate than anyone else in the league. The Canucks enjoyed an eye-popping 10.65 shooting percentage at 5-on-5 this year, by far the best in the NHL (leading the Red Wings by nearly six tenths of a percent).

Nashville actually ended the season as one of the league’s unluckiest finishing teams, scoring on just 8.26 percent of their shots (tying them with the Calgary Flames for ninth-worst in the league). The Predators generated a ton of quality scoring chances in 2023–24 — they ranked third in the NHL in 5-on-5 expected goals per game, according to Natural Stat Trick — but a lack of finishing ability hampered their scoring output, particularly in the first half of the season.

It’s fair to wonder how much coaching has to do with the disparity in chance generation and finishing between these two teams. Predators coach Andrew Brunette has proven over the last few years that he can bring the best out his offensive players, while Canucks bench boss Rick Tocchet has long held a reputation as someone who prioritizes structure over production. In any case, both approaches seem to have worked out thus far.

Defense

Vancouver has Quinn Hughes; Nashville has Roman Josi. While it’s tempting to end this section right there, it’s worth elaborating on just how top-heavy these two teams are on the blueline.

Hughes is in the midst of a truly transcendent season that will almost certainly culminate with him winning the Norris Trophy as the league’s top defenseman. The 24-year-old rearguard has come into his own as a dominant player at both ends of the ice, using his elite skating, instincts, and puck skills to help his team score a ton of goals while allowing substantially fewer.

In more than 1,500 minutes of 5-on-5 play with Hughes on the ice this season, the Canucks have outscored their opponents 91 to 54. Over that same timeframe, the Canucks have amassed 797 scoring chances to their opponents’ 583 while also controlling 54.86 percent of the expected goals (all figures via Natural Stat Trick). Individually, Hughes has set new career bests in every major category, including goals (17), assists (74), points (91), plus-minus (+39), and shots (198). He’s looking more and more like Cale Makar with each passing game.

Josi is a Norris winner himself, having captured the award in 2020 after putting up 65 points in 69 games. Well, there’s a solid chance Josi will be named a Norris finalist once again after racking up 85 points in 82 games this year. Hockey fans around Tennessee will tell you that the Preds would be a lottery team without their captain in the lineup on a nightly basis. In practice, the drop-off might not be quite that severe, but it’d still be dramatic. Even with Filip Forsberg having such a strong year, the folks in Nashville would probably still name Josi their team MVP.

Beyond Hughes and Josi, it’s probably safe to say Vancouver’s defensive committee is slightly stronger. They’ve allowed fewer goals and chances on a per-60 basis all year long. And it makes sense when looking at the two depth charts: Nashville has Ryan McDonagh, Alex Carrier, and a lot of relative unknowns; Vancouver’s group is far from perfect but Filip Hronek, Carson Soucy, Tyler Myers, and Ian Cole have all had strong seasons.

Goaltending

This is another category that is dominated by two stars, with one on each side.

Thatcher Demko is having a career year with this Canucks team. After looking beaten down for much of the 2022–23 season, Demko appears to have rounded back into top form and could very easily be a Roberto Luongo-esque workhorse in the playoffs for this Canucks team. The 28-year-old goaltender is 35-13-2 on the year with a .918 save percentage and five shutouts and has been a key stabilizing presence for a team that is very much still coming into its own as a legitimate Stanley Cup contender.

There’s still one lingering concern with Demko, and that’s his health. He appears to be ready to go for the start of the playoffs after returning from a 14-game absence in Tuesday’s win over the Calgary Flames, but it remains to be seen how he’ll hold up against the unparalleled grind that is the NHL postseason. Demko missed all those games while recovering from a knee injury.

On the other side, there’s Saros, who has had an uncharacteristically average season after a string of excellent ones. Saros had never posted a save percentage below .914 over a full season before this one, but he’s currently at a .906 through 64 games this year. The 5’11” Finn is 35-24-5 with three shutouts.

Both the Predators and Canucks have solid backup options, but make no mistake — this is the Demko vs. Saros show. If it gets to the point where Casey DeSmith or Kevin Lankinen is thrust into action, this series could get wild.

Injuries

The Canucks are relatively healthy across the board. Boeser has sat out the last couple games of the season with a minor injury, and there are still lingering concerns about how Demko and Elias Lindholm will hold up in the playoffs after missing larger swaths of time during the regular season, but this is a team that will enter the postseason largely intact. Barring anything truly unforeseen, Hughes, Pettersson, Miller, Boeser, and Demko will all be there for Game 1.

It’s a similar situation in Nashville — arguably even better. The Predators are entering the playoffs without a single player on injured reserve or LTIR. Their top four scorers (Forsberg, Josi, Nyquist, and O’Reilly) lost one man-game in total all season long. Good luck finding another team with a cleaner bill of health than that.

Intangibles

Frankly, there aren’t a ton of overarching storylines to point at here. I don’t know, what are your enduring memories of the Canucks vs. Predators rivalry? Apart from that one playoff series back in 2011, it’s hard to think of a single showstopping meeting these two teams have had over the years that has stood the test of time.

But that’s not to say new memories can’t, or won’t, be created this time around. Who’s to say Pettersson and Forsberg won’t give us a supreme serving of Swedish showmanship? They’re two players who are more than capable of one-upping each other over a seven-game series. It should also be a ton of fun to watch Hughes and Josi, or Saros and Demko, going head-to-head.

It’ll also be interesting to see how mid-season acquisitions Lindholm and Nikita Zadorov perform for the Canucks after they both faded at times down the stretch. It was particularly tough to watch Lindholm struggle in his first few weeks with the Canucks while Andrei Kuzmenko, who was one of five pieces the Canucks traded for Lindholm, thrived in his debut go-round with the Calgary Flames. Lindholm has a chance to change that narrative in this round.

Series Prediction

This is going to be an exciting series between two teams with a lot to prove. The Canucks have been one of the biggest surprise stories in the National Hockey League all year long, while the Predators rode a wave of terrific play in the second half of the season to get to this point. It’ll be fascinating to see how these clubs match up against each other with fully healthy rosters, too.

Vancouver and Nashville both have strong players at every position. It’ll be Pettersson vs. Forsberg, Hughes vs. Josi, and Demko vs. Saros. But where this series tilts toward the Canucks is with their depth and special teams. Although it’s certainly possible that Vancouver’s finishing luck dries up all at once, it appears far more likely that the Canucks will continue to ride that wave past the Predators in relatively short order. Never underestimate the energy a Canadian hockey crowd can create.

Canucks in five games.